Survivors Remorse: The Myth of the Single Mother

What’s in a Name

Alicia means nobility. I can imagine my cocoa-colored father lifting me up to my ancestors, blessing me with the name. I can't imagine the hopes and dreams of my creators that were embedded in me before I even knew who I was or what my place was in  a world that despises Black womxn and minimizes their struggle. I can imagine the mothers who birthed my lineage with stretch marks and bleeding and crying and death but also beauty and poise and strength and resilience, pouring all of their hopes into my body. It is the sting of endurance; it is the tattered Superwoman Cape that almost killed me.

 Get the Shackles off my feet

Scrolling through memes as I often do, I recently saw one that said, “ The girls who always got talkative on their report cards are powerful af”. I hollered at this meme, knowing that this was a 90s girls staple to be classified as “talkative”. I often wonder when we as Black womxn went from “talkative” to completely silent at times enduring suffering and protecting those who hurt us. Shackles have always been on our feet from the auction block to the gaslighting from those that we entrusted with our innermost experiences. Narcissists weaponise intimacy, the house of whispers that are told in deep confidence are then turned around and used for violence to “expose”. This mental abuse is a musty hand on the mouths of the truth choking down our shortcomings, follies and missteps of womanhood. I believe shackles are on every Black womxn, it keeps them from speaking their truth, it prevents them from screaming out loud in dark spaces or calling out misogyny in boardrooms. Silence accosts our vocal cords and straps us into seats of isolation as we become participants in our own misery, while onlookers believe we like it. These cold and heavy shackles prevent us from letting others know that we are here, that we are human, that we feel like everyone else.  Even as I write I think about Meg thee Stallion who in true Black womxn wanted to protect the Black man who committed violence against her just because that is what she has been taught. What I know is that Black womxn have always protected Black men even at the detriment of themselves, forgoing all sense and sensibility to protect egos, to protect personas and to uphold fictitious and performative masculinity. Something in our rearing has said that, “You do not and should never come first”. Even as I write, I write in a ball of protection because that is what I have been taught and need to unlearn. Your violators should not be the ones that you are so quick to prostrate your body over as hails of bullets fly, especially when they would not dare take a bullet for you. 

The Doctors orders

Motherhood has always been linked to trauma and abandonment for me, much like parts of my childhood. No ridiculous gender reveals, not baby showers filled with frills and love, not smiles to your child upon entry but trauma, a darkness so blinding that makes it feel that you are not alive and a participant in this life. As a naive teenager I’d tell my best friend that I wanted a house full of children. I still gush when I see babies, making funny faces and having spilling tea with them as though I know what their baby babble is all about. Though I know motherhood is a beautiful experience my own was built upon pain, emotional and mental abuse , confusion and self hatred. I am still ashamed sometimes to utter out loud that the day my amazing child came into this world was one of the darkest days of my life. Striving to heal things much like my therapist tells me, “Speak it, stand in it, heal it, move on”. I’ve learned that my healing is being the author of my own truth, my own story in the hopes that another woman can heal as well. My healing comes in giving my pain a name, a sound, giving it just enough breath to sit next to me rather than fester inside my body.

The first night of my motherhood was spent with my sorority sisters. The love they wrapped me in like a warm blanket in New England cold. I will forever cherish those moments as I quickly equated motherhood with sisterhood. They shuffled me back and forth to the bathroom holding on to their shoulders as we did strolling in college parties at our beloved Virginia Union University. We laughed and joked as if we were back in college and as I laughed until my stitches almost burst, I failed to realize that the absence of the person I created life with was a foreshadowed of my life as a mother. 

Daddy’s Girl

I had always foolishly assumed that every man was like my father. He was the father of the fatherless, showing up to all of his daughters events there was not a school play, dance recital, basketball game or choir performance that he would miss. At times in high school I’d bump into him at football games and he’d say I promised *insert any one of our guy friends names* I’d come to his game”. I’d always laugh and roll my eyes, reminding him that he didn’t have any sons, but he did; they were all his kids and he was always a provider and protector for those in need. When I hesitantly told my father that I was pregnant weeks before my college graduation, one of the realest things he said to me was, “ Having a baby is more than a notion”, those words have been embossed in my mind for 12 years.  

Absence, it is the darkness that has crept upon the napes of my back keeping me silenced and subdued. It is the gaze upon “normal families” knowing that my choices have robbed my son of a family that is whole. This is the darkness many single mothers experience but never speak of, the shame that they feel is often the shame heaped upon them by society that tells them their worth is tied to marriage or a man. This shame is further exacerbated in church houses that double as dating services for single mothers because being unwed has been unacceptable in our communities. The “bitter single mother” is a myth I have seen on various social media outlets. The dehumanization of Black womxn is only magnified  in single motherhood. Many see it as bitterness, when it truly is trauma, justified anger and disappointment. There is a certain stinging disappointment, the disappointment of the representative versus the actual person you created life with. The promises that have been broken a million times over,  the expectations that have never been met and the hurtful words that have been spoken upon you, your life and that of your child’s through inaction.There is a sting in self disappointment and inadequacy that has you asking, “Am I doing enough”? “Am I enough”? Can I do more”?  Disappointment keeps us on cold tiles crying as small hands bang on the doors because God forbid we are seen in our human form. Single motherhood is the constant feeling of guilt, the venomous accusations of victimhood rather than survival, the wanting and wishing for more, but understanding that at the time that was the best that you could do. The villainization of single Black mothers just further helps me understand  societies hate for women, particularly Black womxn, this ingrained hate supersedes the hate for absent or inactive fathers. The proof is in the pudding, you always hear about the villainous Cruella D Vil like a single mother and less about the fathers who have checked out or never checked into parenting.  The trope of the single mothers or “baby mamas” are  spiteful and bitter, using child support checks for their own gain clad with acrylics and bushels of crab legs, pushes the narrative that mothers of Black children are trying to come up rather than survive. The survival is the dispel of the actual myth. The disappointment is the dispel of bitterness. What I have learned is that you do not know what you do not know.  You are equipped with the parental tools that you are given and it seems that Black men are often given the short end of the stick. Parental tools are tools that you are given from your parental experience and rearing whilst you pick up tools along the way. The expectations that I imposed, I quickly realized were not my reality. This disappointment kept me often up at night, had me questioning my own poor choices and had me wondering about the future of my Black son in a world that has written him off before he's uttered a word. The strength that I needed was not there so I built a cocoon around him praying to God that it would protect him from such violence. I implore single mothers to create their own healthy villages that are affirming and loving, outside of the toxicity their children may have been bore into. Motherhood is not a destination but a journey for us all and you cannot be everything to everyone (including your children) and be nothing to yourself.  Mothers deserve to live and not solely survive. 

Speak it, stand in it, heal it

Healing has been a continuous journey. Healing has been a mountain that I have climbed all the way to the top, chest high to Oshu and one that I have completely fallen from losing my footing on dirt roads and tumbled to the bottom.  Healing is a journey in which single mothers must face themselves. They must ask hard questions, but also develop an empathy and understanding of their younger selves. Mothers must know why they chose what they chose and who they chose. Healing as a single mother has been much of facing myself, accepting who I was in mirrors when no one was there  and accepting who I am now,  never regretting a minute of it. Understanding our journeys as Black womxn means accepting the fact that we are not perfect, we have and will make mistakes. We are not always whole and we are always looking and striving for more, for better and most importantly for ourselves as women first and then as mothers. Black mothers must choose them everyday because in choosing them they choose their children. 

The Peak: Blackness in the Pandemic

“2020 is gonna be a movie”

The sun peeks through red and blue blinds. I catch a few rays to this pale melanin. The heat permeating from my filmy window is sometimes all I can do to remind myself that this is real. Even in this moment writing has been hard because my mind is a pendulum swinging in and out of this horror movie, jolting me out of my creative space of peace.  I often feel like I’m an extra in a Dystopian saga where only the lily blonde head blue eyed Karen’s survive and us Black folk die in the first few scenes. This is a world where busty white girls running through dark wooded areas always into the bowels of trouble but seem to always make it out alive with their limbs still intact. We furiously scream at them on movie screens, “Girl don't go that way”! Or “Oh you just tryna die”! Worlds where the others face heart wrenching death much like  those in our classics where Cleo took her last step, Ricky took his last breath and Baby G have been our imitation of life. We have always been the sacrificial lambs of any tragedy in reality and behind white screens, this pandemic is no different. 

Glass Case

Sweaty  palms on a sweaty forehead in dark corners and damp void spaces. I try not to cry and when I do I just sit on the cold porcelain tub allowing  the waves of the world to wash over me. I snap back, wash my face and get back in the game. Bathroom cry sessions are a common occurrence that I've always been  accustomed to, but are hitting a bit different these days. Wash,rinse,repeat. Routine is one thing that allows many with anxiety to calm themselves. I often mourn the unknown as millions of scenarios race through my mind so the “knowing” at times subsides the anxiety. Lists, checks,balances and schedules are helpful to remain in the now and sometimes those things are not enough. If you've ever seen Groundhog Day with Bill Murray you would know that we are living the same day over and over and over again, not knowing when the groundhog will show its shadow and allow for us to feel the warmth of the sun. Helplessness and fear is all my extended chestnut arms have to offer on the pulpit of Blackness. I fear for my people. I feel like I can't do anything for them, like I’ve failed them, as America always has failed us from inception in our mothers wombs. These sacred offerings are honest but less helpful than I’d hope.  For many of us this is a nightmare that has always existed but is now just inflated by the outbreak of the pandemic.

The World is All a Stage

Refraining from too much news consumption , I swallow the hollow pill that some of my people will die unnecessarily, people will  starve without warrant and all the government is going to do is posture like a 19 year old Frat Boys over the last partially conscious woman. They are truly birds of prey, puffing out their chests and friling their feathers in such a  performative fashion that our community has found it humorous. Nothing is about the people, everything is about capitalism and greed. They say the only color people see is green but they’ve never woken up in Black skin. Black communities are not at all surprised that racism does not die in the eyes of a deadly virus. I've heard people tell me that  they are not wearing masks in fear of violence that comes with melanated skin. I see those same people having to go out and feed their families because most of them are essential workers. What do you do when what you were born with is already criminalized? Now in order to protect yourself you have to look like the same criminal that they envisioned in their minds long before you’ve uttered a word? We have always lived between these two worlds: Who we are and who everyone thinks that we are. The humanity that Americans have found for each other is not reserved nor has ever been for us.  All we need to know about America is that while Trump supporters break social distancing and protest in the streets untouched, our people are being dragged out of Walmart's and off of buses for both wearing masks and not.

Survivors

Blackness has always been a beautiful struggle, a struggle that some are now feeling and don't know what to do with.  Even though it is only the tip of the iceberg experience daily, some and a peek into our existence, some are beginning to see what lies beneath posturing and fallacious rhetoric.  We shine regardless. Black businesses have been thriving, more art is being created and more humor is emerging filled with infectious brown laughs to get us through as we always have. Some of us are  finally able to live, able to breathe and to take up space in a place that has never held a humane spot for us. This too shall pass. We've got us. We always have. We will survive this and when we do we will  step out together, soaking in the sun that bows to us as we bow to her. 

The L Word

 A Word That Comes and Goes 

What we knew about love as little Black Girls clad in fluorescent scrunchies and butterfly clips in the 90s, was the love of Jesus. My two sisters and I  sang gleefully about it around the house dancing like David danced to Fred Hammond, crooning about it to Kirk Franklin’s Nu Nation album and two stepping in reference to it to anything Hezekiah Walker. We’d recite 1st Corinthians by the age of 4, not truly understanding the gravity of what we were saying, rather a muscle memory of being born to a Preacher’s Kid.  My father would always remind us, “It is your job to protect each other”. The love of family was one that was instilled within us though not explicitly. Beyond scripture and family, I never really understood the entire concept of love whether it was romantic or platonic. 

The Sweetest Thing

“Why is sis in the rain for this brotha”? Doesn't she know her hair isn't covered? There isn’t a bonnet or CVS plastic bag in sight I mean really girl”!? A perplexed 13 year old me watched the screen intently, marveling at Black Love on the silver screen, where the Black man wasn't some sort of dealer or gang banger. Love Jones quickly broke up the monotony of the endless 90s romantic films that always seemed to star Julia Roberts or Sandra Bullock. While I loved While You Were Sleeping, I never truly understood why there weren't many movies like it starring people who looked, dressed and sounded like me. The first time I ever saw Nia Long and Larenz Tate kissing in the rain, I immediately proclaimed to myself, “Oh I want that”!

Sprung

  Nia was possibly the most beautiful woman I had seen since Halle Berry in Boomerang. Her strong cheekbones were complemented by her short jet Black bob she’d put behind her ears, that I’d later rock in my 20s.  I.was.hooked. This love story also starred the incomparable vampire esque ( he just refuses to age okay!) Larenz Tate who had been my male on screen crush since he kissed Jada Pinkett in The Ink Well. For me, this display of Black Love was a match made in literal heaven.  I watched the two 20 somethings fall in love through incense, cigarettes and poetry, I’d play and replay my Fathers VHS tape until the black film almost fell out of it’s cartridge. Watching the two slow dance in the dark to Coltranes’ Sentimental Mood put me in a fantastical trance convincing me that love was solely about romance and kind gestures. I never once stopped to realize that what was on screen was not necessarily true in living color. At 13 however, I began to develop a sort of idealism that would affect my relationships for better or worse. Like many other Black and Brown children, emotions and feelings were not at the top of our parents priority list, therefore many of us began to grapple with our emotional intelligence with each other and were naturally impacted by what multimedia defined as love or a loving relationship. This emotional awakening was both impactful and dangerous for many. 

 They Say I’m Hopeless 

The first time I entered a therapy session was about 2 years ago.  After 6 months of scouring the internet for a therapist of color I finally found a great fit on therapyforblackgirls.com.. I was so elated that I’d finally found someone who would “get me” in a way that I have never felt like a non POC would. Sitting on her couch one of the first questions she asked was, “What were you explicitly or implicitly taught about love”? Stumped, I may have sat for a few uncomfortable minutes searching the crevices of my memory for an answer to her nuanced question. I began to wonder, how don’t I know the answer to this? The actual teaching piece of the question, had my mouth gaped open so hard, I am absolutely certain a fly went in and out. I began to ask my sisters, friends and acquaintances the same question that my therapist had stumped me with. I would regularly hear that same awkward pause as they tried to reach back into their childhoods, attempting to recollect a time when they were spoken to about emotions such as this. Throughout my discussions, I would often find that most were not explicitly taught about any kind of love and would rather observe those around them within their households, through music lyrics or via television and/or movies. Many people said that it was not spoken about at all, while others said they learned through observing their parents, aunties and uncles relationships which were often toxic. This begs the question: If you are not taught about love, how are you able to teach others?

Sumthin’ 

Multimedia influence is stronger than ever before and the emotional labor of it all makes it difficult to live and understand love in this skin. Many search for love through control, acclaim, attention and other avenues that allow them to be both seen and heard. When I speak to my students, many feel love is solely steeped in how much pain one can endure to “deserve” this mystical achievement. As an educator and a mother, I know that children are always watching, grappling for their own emotional understanding and their skewed perceptions are rooted in their optical views. Quite simply: Children don’t follow what you say, they follow what you repeatedly do. As an adult, I now understand that some parents who did not explicitly teach their children about love may have been more concerned with their children's survival in a world set out to destroy their physical bodies, than the preservation of their emotional wellness. Like me, many POCs are now seeking healing from various emotional pitfalls and resurfacing a new, seeking to rewrite the narrative for our children. In a world where we are told everyday implicitly & explicitly not love ourselves nor those who mirror us, Black love is indeed a revolutionary act.

White Saviors, Brown Schools

I’ve Got A Testimony

“Why does the city think that in order to fix a school the DOE has to flood it with white people to make it better? White doesn't mean better Ms. McNeal ”, my perceptive student cried out,  after my entire AP class had just vented to me about their new teacher who’d just told them that, “Everything is not about race” & “Black people need to take responsibility for their poor behavior”. Not at all shocked by Ms. Bailey’s articulation of the collective, I sat for a minute and exhaled, knowing that my students are now being inundated with what I had been inundated with throughout my 34 years of Black experience: White saviors in schools of color. 

When the Saints Go Marching In

Speaking of the White Savior Industrial Complex Teju Cole explains, “ The White Savior Industrial Complex is not about justice. It is about having a big emotional experience that validates privilege”.  This complex is a vital part of systematic racism & Anti-Blackness in the U.S. . As an educator of color, I have seen saviorism first hand in charter schools in particular.  Most charters I have worked at have been both founded and run by white people, with a student body of 98% children of color erecting from impoverished neighborhoods. Black building leaders hit an embarrassing 9%, while Latinx make up just 3% of building leaders around the U.S.. All too often within the charter world people of color are only granted promotions to Dean positions with the idea that if your are of color, “You can control the kids”. There is a figurative glass ceiling within the educational field where white leaders quickly pull white teachers out of the classroom abruptly and put them on the road to leadership, whilst pigeonholing dynamic teachers of color into the classroom for decades, until they burn out and leave the field at alarming rates. I have seen this cycle of inequity for over a decade and always ask myself why? Why aren't teachers of color being nurtured to lead schools as white teachers are? Why is there still no equity within school leadership? Why is there not enough cultural competency training given for not only the teachers in front of the students, but also administration? These questions have always stalked me like unwanted DMs from men who just “wanna be friends”. 

Revelations 

This young one in particular reminded me so much of myself at 16, hyper aware and questioning why things are the way they are. As I sat staring at my her round troubled face, searching for an answer that made sense in her head of box braids, I bowed my wrapped head and had nothing to tell her. These are questions I still have no answers to but  Wayne says, “Numbers don't lie”. The importance of educational equity is apparent and impacts the school suspension & expulsion rates, graduation rates and college attendance rates, if that is the pathway children choose. 

Benediction 

Yet and still the lack of diversity within leadership is painfully obvious, as new leaders enter schools like seasons come. Under 2 schools of initial Black leadership, I have seen the Education departments swarm in spaces of color with all white consulting agencies, white principals and executive directors who present as superheroes, red cape and all. These magnanimous like figures  swoop in, egos first much like the White Jesus dawned on many church walls, straight stringy hair and blue eyes of pity to the poor Black and Brown children that need saving obviously. What is the worst is seeing students cling to the hem of off white garments, rather than becoming confident in their own right and merit, they become content in being pitied for being poor and Black for no other reason than familiarity from the beginning of their educational life. I have seen students of color devolve from ambitious spirits to entitled and unmotivated, feeling that things need to be given to them, not earned. These saviors appear to be less concerned with giving students access and more concerned with some weird self fulfilling gratification that eases white guilt at night. Ms. Bailey is a megaphone, disrupting docile sleep and false allyship. James Baldwin once said, “The paradox of education is precisely this - that as one begins to become conscious one begins to examine the society in which he is being educated”. Decades later I share the same sentiments, hands up in lengthy wooden pews praying that change is near.

Tired Black Woman

Stay Woke

“You have to work twice as hard to get even half of the acknowledgement they get”, were the words of my father when I was 15 and struggling to survive in an advanced honors english class of all white faces. Every sistah I know has echoed this same mantra, remembering that it had been told to them since their conception. Though I was an average High School student at best, I was plucked out of a general ed english class and placed in advance classes early in my high school career. In a sea of white faces, I stuck out like a sore thumb. When asked about anything pertaining to enslavement I’d feel the piercing awkward stares of my peers aimed at me as I sunk deeper into my seat thinking, “Am I the slavery officianado or what”?!  My father's words were both a haunting echo of perfectionism and a daily reminder that everyday of my Black life would be a struggle to prove myself.

No Rest For the Weary

Drumming up old memories like ESPN playbacks daily, I have thus come to the conclusion that it is tiring being a Black womxn.  While I relish in my womanhood, motherhood and bountiful Black ass excellence, I am exhausted. Waking up daily is a feet within itself, putting one pedicured foot in front of the other and chasing the proverbial “bag”.  As Black womxn we don't have much time to sit in our greatness because we are always walking into rooms where we have to fight and scrap and scrape for every inch of what we have rightfully earned on our own merit. From being constantly questioned about my qualifications, to being looked over for promotions, to literally being looked through by white faces with half the qualifications and a fraction of the talent, I am often left to ask myself and my sistahs,  “Are we not here? Are we not working our asses off and delivering? When will we be enough?” This idea that we have to do the most to get the least is a weighted blanket that lulls me to sleep at night restricting my airways.

All My Life I Had to fight

Sophia's heartbreaking words in  Alice Walker's critically acclaimed book ,The Color Purple  reign so true, “All my life I had to fight. I had to fight my daddy. I had to fight my brothers. I had to fight my cousins and my uncles. A girl child ain't safe in a family of men. But I never thought I'd have to fight in my own house. She let out her breath”. This breath is one many of us must take before we go into complete and utter breakdown.  These words had always seared my soul as a Black womxn. I have always felt as though I've been put in a boxing ring with one hand tied behind my back, sticking and moving through misogynoir, toxic masculinity and white privilege within my decade long career in education. Being promoted twice in one year, only then I realized that as a teacher on level with my male counterparts everyone loved me. Interestingly enough,  as soon as I became their superior a barrage of anonymous complaints about my attitude, questioning around my qualifications, tongue and cheek jokes and even inappropriate insinuations about how I got promoted began. Taking up residence in spaces and places where many felt like I did not belong, I have been convicted to leave the door and windows cracked open for my students to gain access to all rooms.  As my beautiful and impressionable Black and Brown students looked up to me as a big sister, I found that the shadow of white saviorhood has continuously barricaded the door to said spaces. I had never sought out to be a martyr or savior, but a sister to those seeking equity. This reality left me in a space where I felt a million feelings and none at all. This figurative aggression began to take over me and could not be left at bay any longer. I had asked my father how he dealt with similar situations in the corporate world and he reiterated, “Never let them see you sweat babe.”

I have towed the line of humanity and robotics because I know all too well that in this world my leadership is a lack of teamwork. My decisiveness is frigid inflexibility and my passion aggressiveness. Both Black and a woman cognitive dissonance is a means of survival. Always to be questioned, distrusted, undermined, over worked and under valued. These harsh realities and skewed views of who we are as womxn in leadership are ones that I am cloaked in daily. Though I never let anyone see me sweat I also wonder when will my sistahs and I ever get rest?

The Columbusing of it All

Found Land

As far back as I can remember the false rhetoric of Columbus sailing the ocean blue was imbedded in my mind. The floral and checkered patterns of my memory goes back to my all white suburb in 1992 where my teacher attempted to teach us the song of fallacies , “In 1492 Christopher Columbus sailed the ocean blue”.  The very precocious 7 year old me quickly raised my tiny hand and blurted out to her, “Columbus didn’t find America people were already here”. Frustrated, the sweat on my teachers tight lips glistened as she took my recess away. Instances like this always make me chuckle because the history I learned in school and that which I learned from my parents always rivaled like Cardi and Nicki stans. One thing was clear to me at a very young age: White folk claim to have discovered most things under the sun and if no one speaks up, nothing will change. In this same vein I was turned on to the word “Columbusing” a few years ago when a colleague of mine sent be a video by College humor called, Columbusing: Discovering things for White People. This hyperbolic comedic sketch highlighted the hilarious yet exhausting way in which many white people insert themselves into spaces and take claim over any and everything they come into contact with. From the colonization of Black and Brown countries to its stinging lasting effects on said communities, this trend of Columbusing seems to be ingrained in the DNA of many people. 

Say What?

Scrolling through Instagram, much to my dismay, I saw a woman named Sarah Martanz  who per Fashion Magazine has been dubbed the inventor of the “Nite Cap”, a $98 silk bonnet meant protect your hair and skin. Martanz allegedly got the idea for the nite cap when planning her wedding. Fashion Magazine went on to say, “To her delight, she noticed how much better her hair looked in the morning, her blowouts lasted longer and yes, her skin improved too”.  Reading this article I blurted out a confused chuckle, “Girl what in the world”? Two things instantly came to my mind, “ Here yall go with this foolishness, you can purchase the same exact cap for like $2 at the beauty supply store.”, followed by a “So the writers at Fashion just do no type of ethical research”? 

Side Eyes & Eye Rolls

After reading this article, like many of my Sistahs there was  a collective eye roll felt round’ the world by those who had ever been called “ghetto” for wearing the bonnet that Martanz allegedly “invented”. Quick trips to the store in our satin bonnets have always garnered snide remarks and stares of disgust when seen on brown skin. This ancestral eye roll sums up how many Black womxn feel as the community has  begun to address this very issue via fashion sporting shirts that decree: “Ghetto until proven fashionable”. In the age of social media Black Twitter has done an amazing job of calling out the columbusing of Black culture. They have made a point to drag a multitude of fashion magazines for praising families like the Kardashians for calling cornrows “boxer braids” and igniting a “new trend” that has been ingrained in cultures of color for centuries.  The bottom line is that Black culture is and has always been one of trend setting and creating what is indeed fashionable. Unfortunately, what we know is fashionable only gets recognition when it is not on our Black bodies. Cultural appropriation is continually weaponized against the community, letting us know that we are the suppliers but not palatable enough to be recognized for our inherit creativity and all around genius. The monetizing of our culture is nothing new. While many of us feel pimped out to the masses, others are just exhausted when our creations are not only stolen but also repackaged for white consumption. To this date Mrs. Marantz has issued a lackluster apology stating that she “stands with those who were hurt” and that she is committed to “honouring the significance of hair wrapping”. This statement can only be interpreted to me as a “Sorry yall but I’m still gonna exploit your culture for these coins but my fault”.  The disregard of African lineage tied to bonnets and hair care created by the community has still not even been acknowledged and quite frankly Mrs. Martanz that is the LEAST that you can do. This cap is the pinnacle of appropriation and willful ignorance. I’d suggest that rather than purchasing the $98 bonnet consumers go out and purchase designer bonnets by Black owned businesses such as 2NaturalGurlz, Peace Crown’d, Baddie Bonnets, Before Bed Headz and Sumo Bonnets. I leave columbusing folk with a word: You cannot invent something that already existed, just like Columbus couldn’t discover land that was already inhabited by the Indigenous Peoples.